Daniel and Ben
by amthyst-fire
Summary: When SG-3 makes a strange discovery on a remote planet, it's up to SG-1 to figure out how to make the universe right again.
1. The Journal of the Whills

**AN: For those of you new to my writing, welcome. For those of you familiar, no I'm not dead. I keep trying to wrap my head back around the stories I already have in progress, but, alas, I have thus far been unable to. I will keep trying. I do intend to finish. In the meantime, this has been bouncing around for a couple of years, and it's up to several finished-ish chapters, so I thought I would give posting it a try. **

* * *

Daniel sat at his desk; glasses perched precariously on the end of his nose as he poked through the translations that he needed to get done that day. There were always more on his desk, with more arriving daily than he thought that he could get through in a week. Fortunately, he was now down to being only a week behind. He'd been able to beg, steal and borrow every archaeologist with any proficiency in any ancient language from every other military application that required archeologists. He was astounded that there had been any in the first place, and most of them would have been perfectly happy to sign away their first born child, if only to get away from the drudgery of whatever desk that they'd been stuck behind.

That left him a week behind, rather than a year behind. Unfortunately, getting help from less proficient people meant that they translated the easy stuff, like Latin, or Greek. He could do that in his sleep, yes, but occasionally it would have been nice to have an easy day. Only a couple of them were proficient in Goa'uld, and even then only the most common dialect. He could shove some translations off on to them, but not many, and he still had to sort through them to see what dialect they were in before he handed them off to Sheffield or Timmons.

He picked up another tablet, scanned it; it was a list of trade goods. He put it off into a huge pile of similar tablets. He hated finding those kinds of things. They made nice museum pieces, but otherwise were absolutely useless. He picked up the next one. It was actually useful; it seemed to be a list of gate addresses. He pushed his glasses up to a more secure perch, picking up his jacket and shoving one arm through before shuffling the tablet to the other hand and finishing the task. He walked up toward the control room. Sirens started going off. _Unscheduled Offworld Activation, _blared the speakers repeatedly. He sped up, getting into the room first. Sam and Jack were pretty much right behind him, and Teal'c came in a few seconds later.

"It's SG-3, sir." Siler said. "They are sending a transmission via the MALP."

"Hey, could you send someone who's good with languages? Carver swears this scrawling on the wall is some kind of language, something he's seen before; but Edwards insists that _he's _never seen it; therefore, it's not a language. All I know is that it's not Ancient and it's not Goa'uld."

Everyone turned to look in his direction. "What?" he asked.

* * *

Siler watched as SG-1 filed into the room, due to the UOA. There were always so many of those. It usually made everyone on the base come scurrying into his little corner of the base, crowding him and making the room somewhat uncomfortable. Surprising, though was that Daniel Jackson was the first one through the door. He was carrying a tablet—he'd probably been on his way already. "It's SG-3, Sir. They are sending a transmission via the MALP," he said, showing the transmission on the computer screen.

They wanted another Linguist. SG-1 to the rescue again. It was so often that SG-1 went out after some disaster or another had befallen a team that Siler wondered why they bothered having so many teams in the first place. He looked at the tablet that Daniel had absently laid on his desk. He'd started to be able to read Goa'uld a little, he'd seen enough of it, but it wasn't Goa'uld, it was a list of gate addresses. He started to look them up. They'd had their disaster-of-the-day, so he was planning to be incredibly bored for the next 6 hours.

* * *

Daniel sighed; he didn't want to go on a mission when he was so far behind. Usually he could keep it down to about a four or five day backlog, but lately…

He suited up, not understanding how Carver, who was your standard issue combat geek, and all around pretty good military type, could recognize a language that Edwards, who was nearly as good as he was with languages, couldn't.

He was the last one in the gate room, _all that ruminating_, he told himself. He let Jack and Sam step in first, then went. Swoosh, he was there. PT-703.

"Ok, people, what is this fuss about?" he asked as the gate deactivated behind Teal'c.

"Come on, it's just over here." Carver told him, over riding the bright red Edwards. "Can't for the life of me remember where I've seen this, but it looks so familiar."

Daniel walked around the corner, and stared in disbelief.

* * *

Jack didn't have a good feeling about this. It wasn't anything specific, it never was. It was just that "Carver says it's a language" didn't feel like a good enough reason for him to take his team out and risk them. But Jack had learned both to trust that the feelings were correct, and to ignore them and do whatever dangerous thing that was setting them off anyway, and to the best of his ability.

* * *

Daniel blinked, and then his brain kicked into gear. "You're kidding, right?" he asked incredulously once he'd found his voice again. "This is trick Daniel day, right?"

"What's wrong with the wall, Daniel?" Jack asked him.

"Um, only that it can't possibly be here."

"Slow down, back up three steps and start from the beginning." Jack told him.

"It's in Aurebesh." Daniel said, as though that would explain everything.

"And I await the profound significance of that statement, Daniel," Jack said as Daniel started to examine the script that was carved into the stone hall with his fingers.

"It's the script that they use in Star Wars, Jack." Daniel said absently.

"So?"

"So, this means that it was real. And if this is real, who knows how much of the rest of it is real?" Daniel frowned. He started to look at the script, translating it in his head. "It's not written in a spoken language that I know." He said absently, looking back and forth between a clipboard that he was writing on, and the first line of text on the wall. He suddenly got the idea to try to translate the letters into Ancient. He did it on the instincts of someone who'd spent years making sense out of nonsense. After about three lines, he realized why he'd been getting nowhere with it—it was written vertically.

* * *

"So what's it say?" Jack asked, as Daniel flipped over to another sheet of paper.

"Oh, ah, I don't know."

"You don't know?"

"No, I was trying to read it like you would English, but it's written vertically. Give me a minute."

Jack waited, counting in his head, to one minute. "So, Daniel, what does it say?"

Daniel had gotten to the bottom of the first column. "It's like a text to the movie, written by one of the characters."

"Which one?"

"I'm not sure yet." Daniel said, distracted by the translation. About halfway down the second column he seemed to find the name. "Here it is."

"So?"

"So, it's not like it's in English, Jack."

"George Lucas seemed to be able to understand it."

"I'm thinking that 'The Journal of the Whills' was not fictional."

"What is the 'Journal of the Whills'?"

"Well, according to Star Wars Mythology, it was a recorded history of the galaxy maintained by a mysterious group known as the Whills. He dropped the concept from the movies, but it's something in the early stuff for the scripts."

"And?"

"It's possible that he wasn't doing creative stuff, but translating from a copy of this."

"So who wrote on the wall?" Jack asked, because Daniel was getting into techno-speak for something he didn't want to know any more about than he already did.

"Ah, I think, Ben Skywalker, although that's like so not his name."

"Who is Ben Skywalker?"

"Luke's kid. But don't worry too much about it."

"And you know this how?"

"By the relationship he indicates to the main characters, these stories are about his father and grandfather." He indicated the appropriate points at which it obviously said those things.

"He also says that he was named for the great warrior that taught his grandfather." Daniel said, picking up the translation.

Jack was always amazed at how Daniel could make sense out of scribbling on walls.

"Ok. So _LUKE SKYWALKER'S_ kid comes to this galaxy, and writes on this wall,. Now what do you propose that we do about it?"

"Can I finish reading what it says first?"

Jack waved his hand to say, 'be my guest.'

* * *

Half a day later, Jack was still waiting for something profound to come from Daniel's translation of the wall, but even going and looking over his shoulder didn't help, because he was writing in Ancient. Worse, it was a bizarre dialect of Ancient that Jack didn't really know. Not that he really knew the one he knew. He just sort of did. Not that it helped at that particular moment. He'd let SG-3 continue to explore the surrounding area, and Teal'c and Carter explored the more immediate area.

"Daniel Jackson," Teal'c's baritone voice rang out.

"What, I'm in the middle of a—" He stopped as he saw the about three-foot-high domed shape that Teal'c was carrying.


	2. Enter George

George sat in the living room, watching his younger daughter playing in the yard with the dog through the big bay window. He was happy with his life. He was amused with how the fans of Star Wars griped about how the prequels went; yet they came in droves to see them. He was surprised that his tale of what was for him history had proven so popular.

Right then he was working on the script for Indiana Jones, or rather the outline. He knew that Steve would flesh it out once he turned it over to him. He was glad that Harrison decided, provisionally, to sign on to the project. He figured Sean would do so soon. He sighed and REALLY wished that Harrison would do another Star Wars film. He really wanted to show Luke's efforts at rebuilding the Jedi Order. Of course he wasn't there for the whole thing. Damn ring. He'd only been a youngling when he got sent to this world, but he had shown promise as a Jedi. He wondered what was happening at home from time to time. He sighed and looked around and seeing no one in sight, he used the Force to pull the iced tea he'd left on the coffee table over to him. He did his best to keep his skills up, but it wasn't easy with this planet's backwater technology. He was surprised to learn when he first arrived that this world hadn't had contact with the larger Galaxy. He wondered how the Republic had missed the planet. He still didn't understand it. Ah well, he had a comfortable life, in spite of losing R2-D2.

The phone rang, and he got up and answered it. "Uh, hi. My name is Doctor Daniel Jackson, and I'm an archaeologist working for the Air Force, and–"

"Have you found R2?"

Silence came across the line from the other end for a moment. "Uh, Yeah?"

"Where are you?"

"I can't tell you that, you have to have clearance."

"I'll have to look it up. Can I have a phone number where I can call you back?"

"You'll have to look what up?"

"My clearance code. It was given to me when I was ten. I haven't exactly needed it since then."

"Um, ok. You can call me at 307-555-1972."

"Thank you, Doctor Jackson," he said, and hung up the phone. He tried to remember which box that information had been stored in, since he'd cleaned his parent's house out. He went outside, calling Katie into the house, and headed upstairs where all the stuff from his parent's house had been stored.

* * *

Daniel hung the phone up absently, and he turned to face the rest of the room, which only contained his artifacts and Jack O'Neill. "Well what'd he say?"

"Oh, ah, he said he had clearance to know about the Stargate already."

"How does a movie director get clearance for the Stargate?"

"I don't know, he said that he's had it since he was ten."

"How does a ten year old—he's had clearance for fifty years?"

"That's what he said. He said he had to find it, and he'd call me back."

"Oh, the general's just going to love this one."

Daniel laughed, wondering again what insanity this mission was going to bring. He remembered the tablet that he'd wanted to look up the information on, and left Jack in his office to go try to find where he put it. He walked down to the control room, where the tablet was sitting, with a note on top of it. He picked both up, and opened the note to read.

_First address-PX-131. Sent SG-4 there. Nothing significant._

_Second address-Address was not in system. Added to list of planets for exploration._

_Third address-couldn't connect when tried, it was already in system._

There was a short note about each of the addresses listed, and at the bottom it was signed, Siler. Happy that he hadn't had to do anything with the addresses himself, he said, "Thanks, Walter."

"No problem. Did you want to check out any of those addresses?"

"Not right now, I'm going to work on trying to figure out why they were listed in the first place."

"While you're waiting for clearance to talk with the big guy in flannel?"

Daniel laughed. "Yeah, while I'm waiting on that, I'm going to translate this tablet."

"What are you guys doing with that droid?"

"Teal'c and Carter are playing with it in the lab. I think she's going to try to see if she can hook into it in any way."

"And clean it up?"

"Probably. I've got to see if I can get this translated. There's like two weeks' worth of stuff sitting on my desk."

"See you later, Doctor Jackson."

"See ya," he said as he walked out of the control room and headed back to his office.

* * *

George looked through half of the box he thought the paper he wanted was in before he found it. He, fortunately remembered which box he'd put it in. He hated going through his parent's things, it was such a bittersweet memory, especially the first few months, learning to speak English, and realizing that there were things that he just wouldn't have words for. It was easier through the Force, to understand what his parents wanted of him, his only real trouble had been getting them to understand him back. He'd been grief-stricken when he'd found that he wasn't going to be able to go home, but the Force had prompted him to press the buttons on the ring that he'd been staring at. It was on an island on Kashyyyk. There were no monsters, no trees, basically nothing but the ring. Then he'd gotten to the other planet, and the Force seemed to abandon him. It took a long time for him to re-connect with the Force—nearly a month. Then, when he did, he tried to push the buttons on the ring device again, as the Force was prompting him to, but he'd ended up here, on Earth, rather than anywhere approaching home.

He sighed, shaking himself out of his memories. They weren't going to do him any good right at that moment. He went downstairs, and dialed the phone, but he didn't dial Doctor Jackson back, instead he dialed the number for his older daughter. "Amanda, do you mind watching Katie and Jett for a couple of days?"

"No, I don't mind. Are you going to see Steve about the last movie?"

"No, I've got something to take care of. An old friend got a hold of me. I need to go visit."

"Ok, Dad. Let me know how it goes."

"I will sweetheart. I'll talk to you in a couple of days."

"No problem, Dad."

"Good-bye."

"Bye," she said, giggling as she hung the phone up. He didn't know what he'd caught her in the middle of, but he'd decided a long time ago that cell phones were the work of the Force. Instant contact with just about anyone was a wonderful thing.

He let the dial tone buzz for a second before he dialed the number that Doctor Jackson had given him. "Hello?" came from the other end of the line.

"Doctor Jackson?"

"Yes," the man answered cautiously.

"I have the number you need right here. 28AA-3437-83BX."

"Thank you, I'm sure you know that I have to look this up."

"Yes, that's fine. I'll speak to you when you call back."

"Thank you. I'll get right on this."

He smiled. "I'm sure. Good-bye, Doctor Jackson."

"Good-bye," Doctor Jackson said, and he hung the phone up.

"Who was that, Dad?" Katie asked, from the other room.

"Doctor Jackson. I'm probably going to go visit him for a day or two, so you three are going to be on your own. Promise you won't wreck the house?"

"I promise, but I can't promise for everybody."

"I understand. He's going to call me back, and then I'm probably going to go straight down to the airport."

"Ok, Dad. When will Amanda be home?"

"I don't know. Soon, I imagine. I have already talked to her."

"Ok," she said, heading off in the direction of her room.

* * *

Jack watched as Daniel wrote down the code that George Lucas was giving him. He took the code from him. "It looks like the old clearance codes that they used to give. The first set of numbers gives a time frame as far as to when it's issued and when it's good until, and AA is like forever. The second set is a place, and the third set is what exactly is being granted access to. X means everything."

"So he has higher security clearance than you do?"

"I don't know. Let me punch it into the computer and we'll find out."

"Okay," Daniel said as they headed down to the General's office. The general was out but they didn't need him to access the system that they wanted. Jack pulled up the database he wanted and punched the code in. They were both slightly awed by what appeared on the screen, which was, "Access granted for one Lucas, George, alias Skywalker, Ben, to any information pertaining to the Stargate program, and the planet which he came from. Subject is classified Higher than top secret. Files maintained at Cheyenne Mountain Complex, room 26-3, drawer 73-2."

Jack glanced at Daniel after he finished reading the screen, and saw him trying to puzzle through something. He looked the screen over again. "Higher than top secret, Daniel, but just on the Stargate. Everything about this project is higher than top secret, or worse, need to know.."

"Oh, oh. Right. Let's go look at the files."

"Ok," he agreed, and cleared the information that he'd entered, and shut the program down, putting it back the way that they had found it.

They went up to the storage room that had been indicated in the file, and found there were a huge number of cabinets there, but the drawers were numbered and all they had to do was walk around to the proper number. "70…71…72…73," Daniel muttered to himself as they neared the end.

Jack pulled the drawer open. There were several files, but the one that they were interested in was the one in the back. There were several items there, but nothing of real note. Just the name on the file told them which one they were to take. "So what is all this stuff?"

"Maybe we should ask George," Daniel said absently as he looked over the stuff.

"So call him and ask him."

"Oh, right." He picked up his phone and dialed the last number, and said. "Well, we've found your files, and you might want to bring a projector for 8MM film. I don't think we have one on base," he said, then paused.

"You do?" another pause.

"Cheyenne Mountain Complex," he said, then paused again.

"Tomorrow?" and another pause.

"See you then," he said then hung the phone up.

"So, what did he say?"

"He'll be here tomorrow morning. We should go pick him up at the airport."

"So he's going to bring a doohickey that will do something with this?" he held up a film reel.

"Yeah, he said he had a little one that hooks up to a computer, no screen, just runs it across this thing that translates it into a digital signal."

"Cool. What do you think of this other stuff?"

He picked up a thin metal rod. "I don't know about you, but I think I know what this is."

Jack frowned. "No."

"Yes."

"Probably no one knows what it is, or they wouldn't have let it into the building."

"Why did they take it from him, I wonder?"

"Well, there are some clothes in here, too. I bet they took everything from him, because he was just a kid."

They took the stuff back to Daniel's office, and spent the rest of the day going through it.


	3. And Fixed

George stepped off the plane at Peterson Air Force Base, which he had been told was near the Cheyenne Mountain Complex. He'd been given special permission to ride on military transport, and he was told he would be met at the Base by someone who would take him in. He looked around, spotting a thin man, much younger than he would have thought this Doctor Jackson should have been, but he'd learned not to second guess the Force in the years that he'd been on Earth. He devoted a second's attention to his companion, and was startled to find that the man had a rather bright Force Signature. _Interesting, _he mused, and headed over to them. "Hello, Doctor Jackson. I am rather surprised to see you here in person," he said, sticking his hand out. Doctor Jackson took his hand and shook it. It was a firm handshake, not something he got often from one so young. He looked to have maybe been thirty.

His companion was quiet, but Doctor Jackson started talking immediately, so he paid attention to what the man was saying. "I'm really glad that you took the time to meet with us. Let's get to the car; it's about a two hour trip up the mountain, and I'd like to get started. You can call me Daniel, Doctor Jackson makes me feel like I should be teaching something or something," he said, waving his arms around wildly. "This is Colonel Jack O'Neil," he said, indicating his companion finally.

"Hello."

"Hello."

"Ok," he said, shaking his head, "The car is over this way," Daniel said, leading the two of them off.

"Is he always like this?" he asked the Colonel.

"Well, sometimes he's worse," Jack said, and it sounded like something that his uncle would have said.

"Well, then I guess I'll just have to get used to him."

Jack cracked a smile, but George could tell that he was quite amused by the whole idea.

* * *

Jack watched as George set up the small piece of equipment to convert the reel of film that they had into a digital signal. It ran through a small box, which attached to the computer via a wire. Jack didn't know what kind of wire, and frankly didn't really care. It took about ten minutes to set up, and ten minutes to work magic on the film.

"Ok, we're ready to go," he said. The General motioned to proceed.

"So go already," Jack said. They had decided to go through the stuff in the file with him first, while Carter tried to work magic with the droid before they let him see it.

George pushed the play button, while Daniel was practically bouncing off the walls with anticipation. The first thing that they saw was a young boy, who looked to be about ten, with almost white hair, though they really couldn't tell quite what it's exact color was, because the film was in black and white. He was sitting at a generic table in a generic room, a place that could have been at any military base in the country, and off screen a voice of an older man said, "Ok, you understand me, right?"

The boy nodded.

"So I want you to tell me where you came from."

The boy started rattling a stream of rapid speech in something definitely not English.

"In English," the voice interrupted.

The boy shook his head.

"You understand every word I say to you, but you can't speak English?"

The boy nodded, and looked very sorry.

"Ok, maybe a more basic question would work. What's your name, boy?"

"Bay-in Escay-wa-lac-ur."

"Say that one again?" he said. The boy repeated the name.

"Ben Skywalker?" the man asked.

The boy looked confused for a moment, but then nodded.

"Ok, well that's a start at least. Now Ben. I know that you understand me, so here's something that we need to talk about. That big ring, the one that you were standing by when they found you, you came through that, didn't you?"

He nodded, looking relieved. "We don't know how that thing works, son, I'm sorry. We've worked on that thing for years since we dug it up in Giza. You can't go back."

The crestfallen look on the boy's face was heart rending even through the film. "Wel-kes al-ag-la na-grath so?" The tone was so pitiful that the message was clear even if the words weren't.

"Well, we can set you up with a family, give you a home here. You look human enough. But first you'll have to learn English."

The scene changed suddenly, to one of the boy and an officer, and a book. He was apparently studying English. The officer was the man who'd been in charge of the Stargate and several other little-known projects from the end of WWII through about 1970. Jack couldn't remember the guy's name right then, but it didn't matter. "General, I do not understand this talk of television. What is it?"

"Well, it's this box, that receives a signal that is carried on radio waves, and turns this signal into a picture with words. I'm not allowed to take you off base, or I would show you. I don't think we have any on base."

"So it is like the Sar-clav?"

The general thought about it for a moment, then said, "Well, something like that. I don't think it's nearly as advanced as what you are talking about, but then a lot of things aren't."

He nodded. "When do I meet this family that I will be having?"

"Well, we'll have to see what we can do about that. I would prefer to find someone who's not attached to the military. It would make your life much easier."

"Yes, sir. I can understand that."

"I know you're homesick, but if we ever figure that thing out, you can come see what's shaking, and maybe we can get you home then."

"Promise?"

"I promise."

The scene stopped, the film was at an end. "I didn't realize that they filmed anything while I was with the military." George said.

"How long was it before you were sent to a family?" General Hammond asked.

"Oh, I don't know. Time doesn't have the same concept when you're ten. A couple of months at most, from the time I came through the Stargate until I was released into the civilian population."

"How did you convince them to trust you?"

"I am a trained warrior, or I was then, not so much anymore. They recognized that fact, even if it was only on a subconscious level."

"Since, of course, ten year olds can't be warriors."

"Grandfather was," he said. "But you probably know that story already."

"Yeah, we know," Jack said, and he pulled out the clothing that had been stored with the film.

"Oh, somebody must have washed these. I was filthy when I came through the gate," George said, taking the clothes.

Jack held up the tube that had been stored there as well. "Is this what I think it is?"

George raised an eyebrow. "Of course. I wouldn't have gotten as far as I did without a Lightsaber."

"So how do you turn it on?" Jack asked.

"With the Force. I just put buttons on them in the movies because people expect such things."

"Show me, I want to see it."

George laughed. "You know you are almost as bad as Daniel in your own way."

"I try." Jack said.

George flipped the internal mechanism to turn the lightsaber on, and it showed a bright blue blade. "There you go."

"You know, that almost made sense."

George turned the deadly blade back off, and clipped it to his belt with a mechanism that retracted when it wasn't in use. "May I keep this?"

"It's yours. I'm not going to deprive you of the only things you brought with you when you were a child." General Hammond said.

George nodded. "Thank you General. Now wasn't the whole start of this thing where R2 was?"

"Ah, yes. Carter has him up in her lab," Jack said, appearing to devote most of his attention to his hands, though that was not the case at all.

"Alright. He's not really that partial to female-types. I think there was a bad experience with a droid with feminine programming along the way somewhere."

"Well, shall we go see what she's up to?"

"Certainly. Perhaps I can help her with whatever she's doing."

"We shall see what she says. She's a pretty smart cookie."

* * *

Samantha Carter was trying to figure out what part of the droid did what, but she wasn't having much luck. She'd gotten him clean, at least. She'd spent a day trying to find an electrical port, but everything that she'd found that looked remotely like it would accept electricity also looked like it would have some other function. And nothing looked like the port that had been displayed in the movie, despite the similarities to the droid standing in front of her.

Jack walked in first, followed by George Lucas, Daniel and the General. "Carter, George; George, Samantha Carter."

"Hello," she said, "I've been trying to find something that looks like an electrical input, but I can't figure out which it is, partly because I'm not sure I know what to look for."

He pushed a small indentation halfway up the droid's body. "It's here. The button is a fail-safe incase something like what happened to R2 happens."

"So, what about getting electricity into him?" she asked as she started cleaning and examining the portal.

"I'm pretty sure that our galaxy ran on alternating current; there's no reason why it shouldn't have. I don't know the voltage or amperage, but we can try different things to get him started."

"So what would you suggest first?"

"I've been shocked by the plug that they use, but it only hurt a little, so I don't think he'd use anything above 120. Try for a low amperage, and adjust it as needed."

"Sounds good. How do you propose we get him plugged in?"

"Bare wire. I don't know that I could construct a plug that would work on his end."

"That sounds reasonable. I can try to rig something up," she said, going over to what could only be termed a junk drawer, and came up with an electronics plug. These, of course differed from normal plugs because they were rated for particular amperages, and they had voltage regulators in them, which smoothed out the current. "I'm not sure what this used to go to, but it can give us a starting point."

* * *

"Good," George said. He looked at the port on R2, trying to remember how to plug in the droid, as in which was supposed to be a grounded wire. He knew that the basic principles of electronics were fundamentally the same, and electronics required that their electricity be grounded, normally. He tried to insert the wires into the small openings, and found that they weren't big enough to make contact with both sides. He sighed, and used the Force to bend the wires into the position that they needed to be in. "Ready when you are, Colonel."

She plugged in the cord, and immediately the droid activated, and started whirring, beeping and in general making lots of noise.

"I don't think he likes it," Jack said.

"It's not shorting anything out. He's disoriented. It's been so long since I've tried to understand Droid that I'm not sure exactly what he's trying to say."

The droid calmed somewhat after a few moments, silent for a few seconds, then made a querying beep.

"I think he's asking what's going on, but I don't remember."

"You're going to have to tell him, no one else speaks your language," Jack said.

"Um, Jack," Daniel started.

"Don't tell me. You read it and heard three words, and now you can add Coruscanti to the list of a thousand other languages that you speak," Jack said.

"Thirty-five, if you want to include the three dialects of Goa'uld that I speak."

"Whatever. Do you think you could talk to the droid?" Jack asked.

"I don't know. I think so. It's not that different from Ancient."

"So give it a shot."

"Sak-al," he said, kneeling in front of the droid.

The droid beeped back at him. "He says hello back." George said, amused as Daniel glanced up to him for translation.

"Tel as-kav-qui et spa-rak Bay-in Escay-wa-lac-ur."

"Well, that certainly got him going, didn't it?" Jack asked several moments later when the droid's beeping died down to a normal level.

"He wants to know why I didn't return for him, or in preference, who messed with his internal chronometer."

Daniel thought for a moment. "Do you want me to tell him?"

George shrugged. "Sure. He's nearly as intelligent as any human, he will figure it out."

"Kes-ta els Bay-in," he said, indicating George. The droid made a sound that so incredibly mimicked a surprised oh, that it's meaning was unmistakable.

"Sak-al," George said to the droid, who responded in hesitant tones, growing more confident as George answered each question and comment. He also remembered more and more of the language of his childhood with each phrase that passed over his lips.


	4. Language People!

**A short teaser before we actually get into the meat of the story. **

* * *

In the several days that George had been at the Cheyenne Mountain Complex, he'd found out a good deal about the Stargate, and the program that they now used to operate it. It seemed to be a good and functional program, and he and R2 had made a couple of suggestions to improve it. Well, R2 had made suggestions and he'd translated. The little droid had adapted well enough to the new environment, and had been of better disposition toward Carter than he'd thought R2 capable of. From what he'd gleaned from talks with his mother, she'd never gotten on well with him. Maybe he just didn't like redheads.

"Well, we were headed back to PT-703, for further exploration. Did you want to come?" Daniel asked him.

"Yeah. I think it would be good for me to go there. I don't know what I'll do when we get there, but I'd like to see it again."

"Is there anything you want to do before you go?"

"I should call Amanda. I left her watching her brother and sister indefinitely. She's responsible, but seven and thirteen year olds get on anyone's nerves after a while."

"Go ahead. We're planning on leaving at 1400."

"Thanks," George said, and found a phone to contact his family.

* * *

Jack watched as everyone gathered in the gate room. "I thought you said the big guy was coming," he said to Daniel.

"He was, but something came up with his kids. He said he needed to go home. He'll be back sometime, when he can, if nothing comes up."

"What could possibly come up?" Jack asked as a cold coil of dread settled itself in his gut.

"I don't know," Daniel said shrugging. "It was just a random thought."

Jack shook his head, squinting as the gate finished dialing, and flushed. They went through, arriving at the now-swarming site of the intersection of two galaxies. He felt uneasy and found that there was really little that he needed to be doing. He and Teal'c settled for trying to do heavy lifting for Sam and Daniel, and hoping that everything stayed nice and boring. Unfortunately, that was not to be. SG-1 was almost superfluous; they did heavy lifting—at least that seemed to be why he and Teal'c were there.

It was nearly dusk when the gate activated again. He had assigned one team dedicated to monitor the gate, so he asked the head of the team, "We expecting anyone?"

"No, sir, this is not a scheduled visit," the man answered, his weapon pointed at the shimmering blue field. visit."

"Great," Jack said, noticing that the dread that he'd been feeling all day had just layered another coil on top of itself.

SG-3 already were was at the gate with their weapons aimed at the opening gate, Jack and Daniel arrived just as the wormhole stabilized. Two people stepped out of the event horizon, a short blonde man and a shorter red headed women stepped out. Upon seeing the SG-3 with weapons drawn, they reached down for the two cylinders on their belts, pulled them, and lit the brilliant blades.

"Hold your fire!" Jack shouted raising his hand to emphasize his point as he walked over to the new arrivals, Daniel joining him on his left. The blonde looked intently at Jack, and nodded closing down his blade, the woman didn't. The blonde said something to her, but she just shook her head.

"What did he say, Daniel?" Jack asked.

"I haven't had time to learn the entire language yet, Jack, but if I had to guess he told her to put her weapon away and she refused," Daniel said.

"Thank you, Dr. Obvious," Jack said sarcastically.

"You asked," Daniel retorted, earning a glare from Jack. Then the blonde spoke, in Goa'uld, causing SG-3 to raise their weapons back up. Daniel quickly responded in the same language and the blonde man nodded, his next words were completely alien to Jack, and he got annoyed when Daniel laughed, then spoke in English, "This is the language we share in common."

The blonde nodded, and paused, then said, "I am Luke Skywalker, Jedi Master. I'm looking for my son. Have you seen him?"

"You're shitting me," Jack said.


End file.
